Mojang has released the first snapshot of the Minecraft 1.19 update, which means players can finally get a proper look at what's happening out there in the big bad wild.
Minecraft Snapshot 22w11a, as it's officially known, adds the Deep Dark biome, a dark, dank place made extra-creepy by Sculk Shrieker blocks that screech and drop a darkness effect in the nearby area when a player ventures too close. The real problem, though, is that all the racket is liable to attract the attention of a dangerous Warden mob. That's not too much of a concern right now, luckily, because the Wardens aren't actually in the game yet, but they're coming so you might as well get used to the idea now.
The update also adds mangrove blocks, mud and mud brick blocks, a new option for 3D directional audio, and my favorite of the bunch, frogs and tadpoles.
I mean, seriously, just look at these guys.
The official rundown of Frogs in Minecraft is great too. I swear this could come directly from a musical bit on Sesame Street:
- Frogs can jump
- Frogs can swim
- Frogs can walk on land
- Frogs can croak
- Frogs can eat small slimes, causing a slime ball to drop
- Frogs can eat small Magma Cubes, causing a Froglight block to drop
- Each Frog variant drops a specific Froglight Block
- Three Froglight blocks are added, a lightsource block
Along with the new features, the Wild update also makes a number of technical changes, tweaks, and bug fixes. To install it, fire up the Minecraft Launcher, go to the Installations tab, and enable snapshots. Mojang warned that snapshots can corrupt your existing world, so you'll want to back them up and run the snapshots in a different folder. Full details on the update and how to set it up are available at minecraft.net.
